Micaela Carosi

18 April 2009

Here first! - a full list of all the Royal Opera House's main stage productions for the 2009/10 season.

The 2009/10 Covent Garden season opens with neither bang nor whimper but with a credit-crunching concert performance on 7 September (repeated on 14 September). Makes a change from last year's Sun readers' special I suppose.

The opera in question is Donizetti's Linda di Chamounix, and the conductor is bel canto genius Mark Elder. The cast includes potential Next Big Things Stephen Costello, Eglise Gutierrez and Luciano Botelho, plus the incomparable Alessandro Corbelli, the first of several welcome appearances this season.

The first staged opera of the season is Nicholas Hytner's lego-loving Don Carlo, with - OMG!- Jonas Kaufmann !!! in the title role. John Tomlinson joins him as the Grand Inquisitor, and the rest of the cast is lifted straight from the first run - Marina Poplavskaya, Simon Keenlyside, fans' favourite Ferruccio Furlanetto, Sonia Ganassi and Pumeza Matshikiza.The conductor is Semyon Bychkov.

Neigh! Francesco Zambello's ghastly Carmen returns in October, with the latest Covent Garden favourite Elina Garanca back for the title role, fighting off Roberto Alagna, Ildebrando d'Arcangelo, and a farmyard full of furry friends. Bertrand de Billy conducts. It's resuscitated again in June 2010 with a distinctly 'B' cast.

October also sees one of Richard Jones's more subtle and effective efforts back on stage - and attractively cast. The shouldn't-work-but-it-does double bill of Ravel's L'Heure Espagnole (Christine Rice, Yann Beuron, Christopher Maltman, Andrew Shore and Bonaventura Bottone) and Puccini's Gianni Schicchi (Thomas Allen, Maria Bengtsson and Stephen Costello) is conducted by Pappano.

Francesco Zambello steps into Tchaikovsky's The Slippers in November. The new production will be conducted by Alexander Polianichko and features some serious talent fresh from the Mariinsky - Olga Guryakova, Vsevolod Grivnov, Larissa Diadkova, Vladimir Matorin and Maxim Mikhailov.

John Schlesinger's elderly Der Rosenkavalier is dusted off in December. Kirill Petrenko conducts and the cast includes Soile Isokoski, Sophie Koch, Thomas Allen and Lucy Crowe.

Littering the December and January schedules is the inevitable La Bohème. This time Andris Nelsons conducts most of the double-cast performances, which begin with Piotr Beczala and Hibla Gerzmava and end with not a few tbc's.

A new Richard Jones production of Prokofiev's The Gambler in February is conducted by Pappano, with a cast including Roberto Sacca, Angela Denoke, John Tomlinson and Jurgita Adamonyte.

Plácido Domingo's first appearance of the season is as a tenor. Graham Vick's acclaimed production of Handel's Tamerlano(recorded in Madrid and availableon DVD con Plácido) makes its first visit to Covent Garden in March with Christianne Stoijn, Sara Mingardo and Christine Schäfer. Baroque specialist Ivor Bolton conducts.

Bill Bryden's family-friendly The Cunning Little Vixen returns in March with Emma Matthews, Christopher Maltman and Emma Bell, though the presence of Charles Mackerras on the podium has to be the main draw.

Caurier and Leiser's lovely Il Turco in Italia is back in April, with Maurizio Benini conducting, and Aleksandra Kursak, Colin Lee, Alessandro Corbelli, Thomas Allen and Ildebrando d'Arcangelo in the cast.

Aida is subjected to the David McVicar magic in April. His new production is conducted by Nicola Luisotti and features Micaela Carosi, Marcelo Alvarez and Luciana D'Intino. Bare naked elephants?

The last of the Big Three, Richard Eyre's subtly intelligent La Traviata, makes its annual appearance in May and July. This time her name's in the programme - Our first Lady of the Camellias is the fabulous former Netrebko sub Ermonela Jaho. Joining her in her long-awaited return to Covent Garden in May are Saimir Pirgu and Dmitri Hvorostovsky. July's 'B' Violetta is Angela Gheorghiu, who makes do with James Valenti and Zeljko Lucic. Yves Abel conducts.

What would tempt Sir Colin Davis back into the pit? How about David McVicar's Le Nozze di Figaro? Erwin Schrott, Camilla Tilling, Maruisz Kwiecen. Annette Dasch, Soile Isokoski and Christine Schäfer head the strong cast.

Antonio Pappano conducts Laurent Pelly's new Manon, coming to Covent Garden in June with the announced cast including Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazón. Anyone fancy a bet?

In one of those rare operatic fairy stories, June sees a baritone with less than a year's experience thrust into a leading role at Covent Garden. Yes, it's Plácido Domingo again, and this time he's Simon Boccanegra. Antonio Pappano conducts a strong cast including Marina Poplavskaya, Ferruccio Furlanetto and Joseph Calleja. It's the 1991 Elijah Moshinsky production by the way, not the Ian Judge one seen last year.

The season ends in July 2010 with the first revival of David McVicar's controversial Salome. Angela Denoke takes the central role, with Johan Reuter as Jokanaan. Hartmut Haenchen conducts.

15 March 2009

Antonio Pappano followed Verdi's opening instruction for his Requiem - il più piano possible - to the letter. The hushed voices of the chorus hovered barely audible above the muted strings. I held my breath. It was the only time in 90 straight minutes I needed to. From where I sat near the front of the stalls, the ear-bludgeoning loudness of what followed masked everything, including what appeared to be a full-blown conversation between the elderly couple in front of me.

I suppose too much noise is better than not enough, but the range of dynamic nuance between f and fff permitted little subtlety. Marked only by a slight shift in volume, the Dies Irae lost its terror. Each time Sir Colin Davis launched into it with the LSO a few weeks ago, I nearly leapt out of my seat. Here I simply shrunk back a little further. The acoustic reflecting panels boxed around the orchestra on stage may have been rather more effective than the ROH realised.

For a reading leaning firmly to the secular, theatrical side, there were surprisingly few dramatic moments, though the trumpets blaring from the side boxes on high in the Tuba Mirum certainly grabbed the attention.

But that said, it was accurately played, perfectly co-ordinated, and there were plenty of compensations in the singing.

Micaela Carosi, a late sub for Barbara Frittoli, looked understandably tentative. A few wobbles at the top aside, she sang confidently and firmly, though I couldn't find her any more engaging than I did in last year's Tosca.

It was almost enough that serial canceller Olga Borodina actually turned up for a change. Her voice was lush and firm, her manner coolly imposing. Worth the wait.

The otherwise reliable Piotr Beczala cracked on the opening note of the Hostias. (Quick, cue the career death announcement!) The most impressive solo singing came from the Russian bass Ildar Abdrazakov in his ROH debut, solid and dignified, but the immaculately prepared Royal Opera House chorus took home the vocal honours.

13 May 2008

Poor Micaela Carosi didn't have the best of luck in her Covent Garden debut as Tosca. On her big entrance - ping - she clipped her toe on something and almost went flying down a flight of steps. As she tussled with Scarpia mid-stab, a letter he'd been writing attached itself to her bead-encrusted shoulder, like some weird origami parrot. Only a tortuous back-scrubbing manoeuvre could make it drop. And the long train of her final act dress had a mind of its own, pausing to admire the scenery until she tugged it back into line.

I'd love to be able to say that after all her trials she delivered a dazzling performance. Well, she sang cleanly, powerfully and intelligently, but more like a stroppy housewife than a volcano of tempestuous passion. It left me cold.

Jonas Kaufmann on the other hand was the real thing. We all sort of knew his role debut as Cavaradossi might be pretty special - I wonder if the Royal Opera House would have been quite as packed out for a lesser tenor. But the brazen intensity of this performance was almost shocking.

It wasn't just the power - pushed to the max - or the thrilling ring to his top notes. He had the courage to make his final showpiece aria, E lucevan le stelle, conversational, almost meditative, a touching reflection on his memories of Tosca. There was tenderness and teasing humour in Qual occhio al mondo, where he drew from Carosi a human side that unfortunately failed to resurface agin later. His ability to bring something different and special to each role is what really marks him out as a performer though - there's never the slightest sense that he's repeating himself or falling back on time-proven tricks.

Paolo Gavanelli's Scarpia was another standout performance, intelligently underplayed with a chilling malice. And as is increasingly the case these days at Covent Garden, the smaller roles were all exceptionally well-filled. I particularly liked Kostas Smoriginas, a smouldering Angelotti, and the wheedling menace of Hubert Francis's Spoletta.

Antonio Pappano, apparently conducting at Kaufmann's insistence, lived up to his reputation as a singer's conductor, allowing perfomers all the space and freedom they needed. The vitality of the performance spilled over into untidiness in places, never to serious detriment, though I wish I'd had money on the horns mucking up the start of the third act - in retrospect, a banker.

The low lighting at the start of each act was irritating - I want to see what's happening on stage, not just guess at it - but other obvious staging pitfalls were avoided, and I liked Scarpia's torture chamber, set James Bond-style behind a fake bookcase in the study.

But the nicest thing I can say about Jonathan Kent's scrupulously literal production, here on its third outing, is that it doesn't get in the way much. Unless you're an accident-prone soprano that is.